"But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality and hypocrisy." (Jas 3:17-18)
Nowadays, so many Christians are just Christians by name but don't even know the fundamentals of the faith. How about us, do we make an effort to know more our faith? Our greatest challenge is to make a difference in this world by integrating our faith with our words, with our options and in the activities of our everyday ordinary life. Know your faith to be able to live it and be worthy to be called Christians. "Should anyone press you into service for one mile, go with him two miles." Mt 5:41
'Go the extra mile.' The measure of Christian life is not so much based on fairness, but generosity; not on calculative human justice, but a limitless divine justice. God does not promise to make life fair. He promised the fulfillment of generous loving. Don't let your happiness depend on what others do; let it depend on God's goodness and joy in giving Himself. "Who do you say I am? Peter answered, 'You are the Christ.'" (Mark 8:27-33)
Today, Jesus wants us to recognize as lay faithfuls who He is in our life. It is trees walking around." Then again He laid His hands on his eyes; and he looked intently and was restored, and began to see everything clearly." Mk8:22-26 We witnessed the situations of our families, neighbors, friends, acquiantances, or even strangers that need our attention; and how many of us act willingly to give help? JESUS is spitting at our eyes twice to cure our blindness and see the truth and act for the common good. Put out into the deep water! There are so many reasons not to listen to God’s call and to refuse his invitation, but when God choose you what is impossible becomes possible. I attended a retreat last weekend and it was my first time to attend a silent retreat. I was being taught that for me to encounter Jesus I have to be open, I have to take out my fear, and ask him to teach me and to show me who really is he. And the invitation for me was to go into the deep water, to go deep with my relationship with him. "Man is justified by works and not by faith alone." (James 2:14-24)
People are complaining about poverty and injustice. A lot of people think that they are small, poor, and incapable. No one is too rich and too poor, it is always in the eye of the beholder. As lay faithful what work we can do to inspire people to change their point of view about poverty and let them know that we have a big God to help us? Let's inspire people to dream and work out their dream because no dream is too big and no dreamer is too small. "Who do you say I am? Peter answered, 'You are the Christ.'" (Mk 8:27-33)
Today, Jesus wants us to recognize as lay faithfuls who He is in our life. It is only through recognizing His real identity in our life that we can make true to our options and commitment to stand up for Him as His disciples and authentic in living out His life to promote and preserve the common good for all mankind. First, allow me to say a warm hello! I am Jovello Gomez Jr., a Verbum Dei disciple. I would like to share my experience with our silent retreat last February 15-16, 2014. The theme was from the passage of Luke 5, “Put out into the deep water...follow me”. It all started with a mind-boggling dynamic in which I was asked to right something about myself which others know, then allow others to write what they see in me that I don’t know. Then I had to write something about myself that others don’t really know. The last thing was to write what I think God says about me. Sounds silly especially that last part. What I think God says about me? I don’t really know. However, as the activity went on during the night, there had been a gradual realization of what’s going on. "Consider it all my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance and let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." (James 1:1-11)
In our everyday life we experience trials and problems to test us. Faith in God enables us to fight and endure against temptation to cheat, to lie, to be corrupted by the world. Let us ask God to increase our faith so that we can stand firm against the temptations that surround us and be an example for others to follow. |
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